Steve Polito on Marinatto

[CL82]

StevePoliti Anybody else get the impression, when John Marinatto buys a car, he believes the dealer when he says, "this is the best price you'll find!"

This.

 

[freescooter]

This.[/quote
It is possible to be in an impossible position and to be incompetent, on top of that. I've been arguing forever that the Big East wasn't salvageable as structured. Maybe an incredible commissioner could have held it together. But Marrinatto has made things worse...that he had no clue that Pitt and Syracuse were leaving, and now after hsi comments on TCU, it is clear that he not even respected by his own membership.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

It know it is fun to make Marinatto jokes but you guys realize that blaming him for this situation is like blaming the head of accounts payable for Lehman's demise. Sure it was a senior position, but they guy didn't have nearly the juice you think he does. He is an employee of the Presidents.

His job is to oversee administrative functions of the conference (referees, tournaments, etc.), market the conference, and most importantly negotiate the TV deal. He never got a chance at the latter, and the first two were working fine.

There are 8 people responsible for this mess. The presidents of the 8 football schools. No one else.

 

[businesslawyer]

It know it is fun to make Marinatto jokes but you guys realize that blaming him for this situation is like blaming the head of accounts payable for Lehman's demise. Sure it was a senior position, but they guy didn't have nearly the juice you think he does. He is an employee of the Presidents.

His job is to oversee administrative functions of the conference (referees, tournaments, etc.), market the conference, and most importantly negotiate the TV deal. He never got a chance at the latter, and the first two were working fine.

There are 8 people responsible for this mess. The presidents of the 8 football schools. No one else.

plus 1000.

See -- when you speak the truth I will happily agree with you.

 

[jpm25]

It know it is fun to make Marinatto jokes but you guys realize that blaming him for this situation is like blaming the head of accounts payable for Lehman's demise. Sure it was a senior position, but they guy didn't have nearly the juice you think he does. He is an employee of the Presidents.

His job is to oversee administrative functions of the conference (referees, tournaments, etc.), market the conference, and most importantly negotiate the TV deal. He never got a chance at the latter, and the first two were working fine.

There are 8 people responsible for this mess. The presidents of the 8 football schools. No one else.

I'd love for you to apply the same logic and reasoning to why you are coming down on Herbst.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

I'd love for you to apply the same logic and reasoning to why you are coming down on Herbst.

I am pretty sure she is one of the 8 presidents. She is a decision maker. Marinatto is a clerk.

 

[jpm25]

I am pretty sure she is one of the 8 presidents. She is a decision maker. Marinatto is a clerk.

Fair enough. I'm not disagreeing with you, but curious why you think Dan Bebee lost his job?

 

[sportsart]

I agree with Waylon that Herbst is partially to blame. She should have been on top of this years before she became president.

I blame her for BCU and company leaving as well as the war in Iraq.

 

[businesslawyer]

I heard that she and the Providence office were behind the Princess Di car crash as well.

 

[Hoophound]

plus 1000.

See -- when you speak the truth I will happily agree with you.

Marinatto isn't a visionary and he didn't rally the troops to do what needed to be done. I'm sorry but he is the leader. If you won't put the blame on the leader of the conference then you can't blame Obama for anything either. The commissioner needs to have his finger on the pulse of these matters. It is his whole focus while the college presidents have many more things to worry about. I can assure you a different commissioner could have saved this conference. Maybe not any other commissioner, but a guy like Luck or Jurich or Swofford might have. This was a major challenge, and he couldn't or wouldn't (my opinion) make the bold moves. If the Big East should have signed that ESPN contract, he should have known it and sold it. Instead, he listened to Pitt et al, THEN publicly gloated about the great position the Big East was in after rejecting the contract and then let Pitt and Cuse stab us in the back. He never saw it coming. Sorry, he needs to shoulder a lot of blame. He's either gullible, indifferent, or underqualified. I tend to think he always looks out for the bball schools and listens to them and by doing this, repeatedly shoots himself in the foot.

 

[freescooter]

I am pretty sure she is one of the 8 presidents. She is a decision maker. Marinatto is a clerk.

That is nonsense. He'snly a clerk if he lets himself be a clerk. BL and I have this debate many times over th years...a conference commissioner or any CEo, Executive Director or whatever other leadership position you name can be a leader or he can be a clerk. As a former city manager told me, I can wait for the council to come up with ideas or I can set a direction and bring them along with me. Marinatto waited for leadership to come from somewhere. Like him or hate him, Swofford makes decisions and brings his bosses along with him. Same with the Big 10 Commissioner. As I said, you might be in an impossible spot, but that doesn't mean you're not incompetent.

 

[uconnfan68]

It know it is fun to make Marinatto jokes but you guys realize that blaming him for this situation is like blaming the head of accounts payable for Lehman's demise. Sure it was a senior position, but they guy didn't have nearly the juice you think he does. He is an employee of the Presidents.

His job is to oversee administrative functions of the conference (referees, tournaments, etc.), market the conference, and most importantly negotiate the TV deal. He never got a chance at the latter, and the first two were working fine.

There are 8 people responsible for this mess. The presidents of the 8 football schools. No one else.

Not quite. Add the other 8 presidents in the league and you've got it. They all share the responsibility for this mess.

 

[SAMCRO]

That is nonsense. He'snly a clerk if he lets himself be a clerk. BL and I have this debate many times over th years...a conference commissioner or any CEo, Executive Director or whatever other leadership position you name can be a leader or he can be a clerk. As a former city manager told me, I can wait for the council to come up with ideas or I can set a direction and bring them along with me. Marinatto waited for leadership to come from somewhere. Like him or hate him, Swofford makes decisions and brings his bosses along with him. Same with the Big 10 Commissioner. As I said, you might be in an impossible spot, but that doesn't mean you're not incompetent.

Bingo. IMO, a big part of his role is that of a consensus builder. Finding the common ground. Being an influential leader capable of getting all parties to recognize what the grater good actually is (as opposed to what those individuals think it is). It's about enriching the value of the athletic conference as a whole. He did nothing of the sort. Sure, he inherited a lemon when he took the job, but he was on the staff that let this lemon get to this point. With this, the FB presidents are just as responsible for where the BE is today too. They did have an opportunity to make some demands for change, and could have played hardball 5 years ago. They didn't Then again, when Tranghese retired, they could have demanded a different leader for the BE. They didn't.

 

[Nostical]

Sorry, but Nelson and Biz are wrong on this one. Sure the 8 Big East Presidents are in charge, but weren't they also in the Pac12? You think Larry Scott saw himself as a clerk, waiting to carry out the wishes of those 12 Presidents? I think it's fair to say few of these Presidents ever had a vision of what could actually be accomplished, and many said so after Scott brought them his analysis and fresh ideas. It's up to the conference commissioner, as an innovative and proactive leader, to deliver bold plans for dealing with the kinds of realities that loomed on the horizon. Realities like TV deals or separate networks. Or additions and golden handcuffs. Is there anyone who honestly thinks Larry Scott (as one example) would not
have made a difference sitting in that Providence chair?

 

[nelsonmuntz]

Sorry, but Nelson and Biz are wrong on this one. Sure the 8 Big East Presidents are in charge, but weren't they also in the Pac12? You think Larry Scott saw himself as a clerk, waiting to carry out the wishes of those 12 Presidents? I think it's fair to say few of these Presidents ever had a vision of what could actually be accomplished, and many said so after Scott brought them his analysis and fresh ideas. It's up to the conference commissioner, as an innovative and proactive leader, to deliver bold plans for dealing with the kinds of realities that loomed on the horizon. Realities like TV deals or separate networks. Or additions and golden handcuffs. Is there anyone who honestly thinks Larry Scott (as one example) would not
have made a difference sitting in that Providence chair?

Larry Scott wanted to go to 16. The Presidents told him to stop at 12.

 

[husky10]

Sorry, but Nelson and Biz are wrong on this one. Sure the 8 Big East Presidents are in charge, but weren't they also in the Pac12? You think Larry Scott saw himself as a clerk, waiting to carry out the wishes of those 12 Presidents? I think it's fair to say few of these Presidents ever had a vision of what could actually be accomplished, and many said so after Scott brought them his analysis and fresh ideas. It's up to the conference commissioner, as an innovative and proactive leader, to deliver bold plans for dealing with the kinds of realities that loomed on the horizon. Realities like TV deals or separate networks. Or additions and golden handcuffs. Is there anyone who honestly thinks Larry Scott (as one example) would not
have made a difference sitting in that Providence chair?

Larry scott's biggest success was negotiating the huge TV deal for the pac-12, something Marinatto never had the opportunity to do yet

 

[Nostical]

That's right Nelson, but he presented bold strokes for the league, which were outside the box, and outside the current thinking of the Presidents. Ultimately, the Texas TV deal was the item that caused the Presidents to step back.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

I am not going to argue Marinatto's strengths and weaknesses, because I have not been impressed by him either. But he is not the one responsible for this situation. 3 of the 9 football schools decided they wanted nothing to do with the other 6.

 

[ZooCougar]

plus 1000.

See -- when you speak the truth I will happily agree with you.

Why do you continually stick up for people that are obviously mediocre and/or incompetent?

 

[ZooCougar]

Even if Marinatto was an errand boy sent by a clerk, he would manage to that up.

 

[WestCoastHusky]

People that think Marinatto is not to blame is crazy. Sure presidents make decisions, but it is also up to the commissioner to help presidents see the bigger picture. Presidents are focusing on running their schools. Athletics are part of it but their main focus is on their schools. Commissioners are the ones who need to have the pulse on what's going on in college athletics. Marinatto is an idiot. He was doing meetings with Swofford and Beebee on ethics when Swofford basically pulled the rug from under his feet.

When Larry Scott want something, he will get it done. If he thought PAC-12 to PAC-16 made sense, it would be happening right now. Texas refused to give in on LHN and that was end of the PAC-16. That's the main reason why PAC-16 failed.

When SEC is looking to expand, they look to Silvie for advice. Same thing with Delaney on B1G. ACC's Swofford is a snake oil salesman, but he looks out for his conference.

Marinatto is one of those guys who play the victim role very well. He could have got all the FB schools together when he took over and made everyone see that the BE needs to go to 10 right away. They waited forever and now we are screwed. Sure 8 FB schools might have to split a little less TV money but ultimately it could have provided some security in numbers. We should have added UCF, Temple, academies or ECU years ago. I have stated 2 years ago on the old board BE should be adding schools to get to 10 or 12. It never happened and now we are all screwed. Sure presidents are the ones ultimately making decisions, but it was up to a competent commissioner to build consensus for a better future. Marinatto could not see past his dinner buffet and BE is now on its last breath.

 

[businesslawyer]

Why do you continually stick up for people that are obviously mediocre and/or incompetent?

Because blaming scapegoats keeps people from recognizing and dealing with the real, undelying problems. I have never said I think the current Commissioner has done a good job, but the use of him as a scapegoat has been used to prevent the hard questions from being asked and discussed. Which are why haven't our fans done more to grow our brand and why did our, and the other football, administrations let us arrive in this place.

But I'll give you credit -- I did LOL at that line.

 

[FfldCntyFan]

One thing that many need to accept is that there really was no winning formula here. Moctezuma is viewed historically as a great military leader but regardless of how superior his skills may have been over Cortes, the Spaniards had far too much firepower for the Aztec's.

We were close to one possible winning formula but timing of outside events killed this (while a few earlier wrong bounces prevented us from fully strengthening our position). There is no sense in reliving events and throwing ifs around but all we have left are ifs. The plan, allowing both sides to split and operate as independent conferences was the closest we could have come to a winning formula and it may have workses, if the window did not open at a time (summer 2010) when the entirety of major collegiate athletic conferences were experienceing more unrest than any time in history. A split, all sports BE football conference could have been in position to add quality membership if, Louisville and/or WVU had pulled out the late season games each lost where a win would have placed them in the BCS title game.

Operating as we were, larger (and to a good extent bloated) than any other major conference in basketball, smaller (and very thin) than any other in football, not being able to address the former while being unable to address the latter without compounding the former and facing impossible resistance from half of the conference membership if we were to consider addressing eiither issue left us in a position to fail.

The largest thing I blame Marinatto for is the complete lack of vision from June 2010 to November 2010 when he saw our survival (and was unable to recognize how precarious it was) as being set by the survival of the B-12 and that he was too blind to see TCU (or anyone really) as a valid expansion candidate until they were thrown in his face.

The second is his refusal to move on the possibility of Nova as our tenth football member (which did cause severe damage to the football membership). If Nova was the only answer, the question was framed to a point where it was no longer valid. The belief that an FCS upgrade (playing in an 18k seat venue no less) into a BCS conference that was continually criticized by the college football world for not deserving its BCS status was a legitimate solution (and the only legitimate solution) was completely out of touch from reality.

 

[CL82]

Disagree. It's like saying the chairman of board isn't accountable because because he only has one vote on the board. Leaders need to lead. That means Marinate had to shape the discussion, provide the vision, and build concensus. Silly to say otherwise.